I will be graduating nursing school next year, and I am trying to figure out what I want to do. I was wondering what kind of positions there are out there that I do not have to work every other weekend, and a holiday. I am a huge family person, and being with my family at night and holidays is very important to me! I do not want to make a lousy salary as well.
I do not care about working one weekend a month, but the every other is something I am not interested in. What kind of jobs do you guys have and the hours? Is the pay okay as well.
Here I am wishing that I could work weekends for overtime. Rats! I have to put up with working from 9:30 AM to 6:0 PM on weekdays.
But for my first 4 years I too had to work EOWE and every other holiday.
You can find what you want, but it won't be easy until you are skilled and even then you'll have to look for a job that doesn't involve weekends. Executive, Occupational Health RN, Doctor's Office Nurse, Diabetes educator comes to mind. There must be others.
On the off chance that this is a real post, I will state that those jobs aren't going to new grads but nurses who have put in several years at the bedside working nights, weekends and holidays. The chances of you getting that job over an experienced nurse is slim to forget-about-it.
Specializes in Psych, Addictions, SOL (Student of Life).
I have only worked two jobs where I did not have weekends and Holidays. One was in an Acute Psych Lock Down. When I was hired I jokingly said to the DON You know I'd really like to have weekends and holidays off. She laughed but I was never scheduled for a weekend unless there was a staffing emergency. I was on the Holiday rotation but our census was often low on Holidays so I would volunteer to be 1st canceled as I work because I want to not because I have to. My husband's income more than takes care of bills. I work for the fun bucks. Being a housewife was never my thing. The other job was working for a company that owned and operated group homes. 7-3 Monday through Friday in office or rounding on homes - but on call 24-7. It worked out to about $10/hr once you figured in all the unpaid overtime since it was a salary position.
That being said and I too am a family person - I knew I was going to have to pay my dues until I got experience. I did Noc shift 7p-7a For two years when my son was little. My husband would take him to school and I would sleep until 3 and pick him up and after the afternoon and dinnertime. Remember when you work 12's you generally only work 3 days a week so there's still plenty of time for family stuff - plus it's good for the menfolk to learn how to survive without you.
The jobs that do not require you to work night, weekend and holiday with good pay are ones that you can't get right out of school. Examples include managerial positions, teaching positions, nurse educator positions, administrative positions. But you need experience and expertise to work those jobs.
You can try for a clinic job. The hours are better (but you may need to work into the late evening or on weekends. Clinic hours are not always 7-3) but the pay may be low.
Or work as a casual...you can usually make your own hours to an extent (you can let staffing know what days and which shifts you can do) as a casual nurse. The only downside is you may not have steady work and your paycheques reflect how little or how much you work. Be warned that casual nurses are needed to cover sick calls and vacations, so the shifts you get may not be day shifts.
As for me? I work full time on a medicine unit, and my rotation include both day and night shifts. My shifts are 12 hours and I work every other weekend and holidays that fall into my rotation.
Unfortunately, there seems to be a slew of nursing students who believe because there is a "nursing shortage" they will be able to find jobs without any difficulty, and therefore finding the Dream Employment (ie: no evenings, nights, weekends or holidays) is just a matter of looking around a bit more. What they don't realize is there is no one holding the door open for them because there is no great need for waves of new grads. Nope.
Time to break the reality for you: what you want you will be wholly unqualified to do once you graduate school.
A job that is well-paid and is daytime hours, no weekends or holidays, will be held by someone who is well-experienced and has much more to offer an employer than any new grad. Time in the field, experiences earned, credentials accrued; that is what you will need to do to get what you want.
As a new grad, you might not even find EMPLOYMENT, let alone the Dream Job, for a long time after graduation. Depending on where you live, new grads can take a year or more to find ANYTHING.
Highest pay tends to be the more acute facilities, ie: hospitals. However, fewer jobs exist for new grads than in the past, so there's hot competition for those spots. And you can bet they will include nights, holidays, weekends. See the theme there?
Those who are most successful at landing decent new grad jobs live in areas of the country where it is difficult to find people who want to live and work there. If you happen to live there, you're off to a good start for at least getting hired somewhere (and you should expect to work those off-shifts and holidays). If low pay is fine, then you *might* be able to find a clinic job; for the most part these tend to go to experienced nurses who are cutting back on hours or are "set" enough to not need to support a family, so the pay is okay.
As a new grad, you might not even find EMPLOYMENT, let alone the Dream Job, for a long time after graduation. Depending on where you live, new grads can take a year or more to find ANYTHING.
This is exactly what I was thinking. You're worried about avoiding weekends, nights, and holidays right now, but you could very well be in a position worrying about paying your bills. There is no nursing shortage, and there are plenty of new and experienced RNs who are looking for jobs.
Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.
Hi everyone,
I will be graduating nursing school next year, and I am trying to figure out what I want to do. I was wondering what kind of positions there are out there that I do not have to work every other weekend, and a holiday. I am a huge family person, and being with my family at night and holidays is very important to me! I do not want to make a lousy salary as well.
I do not care about working one weekend a month, but the every other is something I am not interested in. What kind of jobs do you guys have and the hours? Is the pay okay as well.
Thank you!!
The positions which don't require nights, weekends or holidays AND have a good salary are usually given to experienced nurses who have already paid their dues. They require experience, which you don't have. My guess is that if you want to make a good salary, you're going to have to pay your dues at the bedside, working 50% nights, every other weekend and every other holiday. Or take an outpatient job at a lesser salary. You'll have to decide whether the hours or the salary are more important to you.
I understand wanting to spend time with your family -- but if family is important to you, you can figure out alternative ways to spend time with them. The barbecue is just as much fun on July 5 or 6 as it is on the 4th, and the states that allow fireworks usually allow them a few days before and after the holiday. Santa can come on December 23 or 27, you can be just as Thankful on Wednesday or Saturday as you can on Thursday and most churches understand that you can't be there every weekend because you have to take care of sick people in the hospital.
I just started a job described by the OP. The only time I'll work nights, weekends, or holidays is if I choose to. I got this job through several years of nightshift, weekends, and holidays at the bedside. I don't have as much experience as others in my position, I was very fortunate. I also took a decent pay cut (lost my shift diff) to take this job. I hope the OP can find a job that meets her specifications, but I doubt it.
I know working EOW and holidays sounds horribly terribly awful. But I did it for 17 years while my children were school aged. Four 8 hour shifts a week.
I went to work around 10:30 at night, got home around 7:30 in the morning. I saw my children off to school every morning. I slept 9 am to 3 pm so was awake after school when my kids got home. I never felt the need to sleep in the evening prior to my shift so we were together all evening. I tucked them into bed every night. I was able to go to all my children's school assemblies, all their field trips. etc.
EOW and holidays was no big deal breaker, similar hours of sleep, didn't miss out on anything!
I knew parents who worked the 3 - 11 shift....I can not figure out how that works with school aged kids! And I knew parents who worked 40 hours a week, that would have been harder. I knew parents who worked every weekend, Fri., Sat., Sun., 12 hour shifts just so they could be home all weekdays for their kids.
Honestly the "odd" hours of working in a 24/7 business can actually be good for families!
Working 8 - 5 Mon. to Fri. I would have missed ALL my kids school events, dentist appt's, Dr. appts. etc. Those are the hours that do not work for a young family. However I also met nurses who worked EOW, nights, holiddays., etc., decided they just could not do that, and simply applied for and got jobs in out patient surgery....more normal 8 - 5 closed weekend and holiday hours.
I will be graduating nursing school next year, and I am trying to figure out what I want to do. I was wondering what kind of positions there are out there that I do not have to work every other weekend, and a holiday. I am a huge family person, and being with my family at night and holidays is very important to me! I do not want to make a lousy salary as well.
I do not care about working one weekend a month, but the every other is something I am not interested in. What kind of jobs do you guys have and the hours? Is the pay okay as well.
Thank you!!
I'm also 50% convinced this is a joke, but I'll take the bait.
You're going to be a NURSE (presumably). NURSES in acute care settings are required to work weekends and holidays. How did you not know this? New grads (if they're lucky enough to get a job) mostly work in 24/7/365 facilities.
Do you really think that the rest of us aren't "huge" family people? Did you really not understand that a new grad these days is lucky to even get a job? Did you really think that you could have your cake and eat it too? Cushy hours and maximum pay? I'm sorry if you're real, OP; I don't usually get so snippy online, but there seems to be a whole bunch of new grads whose feet are not grounded in reality. That simply means that they didn't do their due diligence before they chose their career. The sense of entitlement sometimes overwhelms me and I turn mean.
42pines
1 Article; 369 Posts
Here I am wishing that I could work weekends for overtime. Rats! I have to put up with working from 9:30 AM to 6:0 PM on weekdays.
But for my first 4 years I too had to work EOWE and every other holiday.
You can find what you want, but it won't be easy until you are skilled and even then you'll have to look for a job that doesn't involve weekends. Executive, Occupational Health RN, Doctor's Office Nurse, Diabetes educator comes to mind. There must be others.